February 5, 2022

I’m afraid of losing my maiden! A friend shared this comment that was shared with her. There was huge angst wrapped around it as if in the aging process huge chunks of us fall away and disappear altogether. My inner maiden shuddered at the thought. She’s the reason I dance in grocery stores. 

As we just celebrated Brigid and the coming of Spring, I’m reminded that the story of Brigid is woven absolutely with the story of the Cailleach, the Crone. They both hold the energy of the Divine Feminine, albeit different aspects. When it is time for Brigid to arrive, the Cailleach hides her staff under a sacred Hawthorn bush and takes her leave until she emerges once again at Samhain. 

In this, the nature of their relationship is aligned with the nature of the Earth’s seasons and cycles in the northern hemisphere. Through the year the youthful maiden energy of Spring flows into the mature maiden energy of Summer which then flows into the woman’s harvest energy of Fall and the energy of release and death that is Winter.

This reflects our life journey as women. One season flowing into the next, the Divine Feminine energy present in all seasons as it is in the Earth. While we don’t relive those seasons as the Earth does, we gather and take with us the energy, experience, and wisdom from one season to the next. We are mindful and discerning about the wisdom we keep and perhaps those energies and experiences that no longer serve us. But they are never lost to us. And we don’t want to completely lose them. A quick search on Amazon offers no fewer than eighteen books on honoring and reclaiming our inner child. 

We are so bereft of those initiatory traditions that help us navigate our way from one season to the next. There is such a dearth of divine wisdom and discernment for this life journey. We turn to each other, we turn to the Earth and her seasons, and we weave together the threads of wisdom we find. Threads of wisdom we know by heart and soul. Threads that weave a story beyond maiden misgivings. 

Perhaps a bit tired and tattered in places, perhaps a bit frayed around the edges, the tapestry of our lives is whole cloth. It holds the vibrancy of all we have been, the vibrancy of all we have become. 

Blessings of Crone Wisdom,
Judith

February 1, 2022

I wandered into our local Target to the electronics department. I knew exactly what I was looking for, a USB C Female to USB A Male Adapter for my husband’s iMac. As I explained this to the young – although at my age that includes more and more people all the time – sales person his eyes widened over his mask.

He hesitated for a moment. “Don’t take this wrong,” he said, “but I find that people your age never have the knowledge you do.” Apparently a bit uncomfortable about having blurted that out, he continued to tell me stories of people in their fifties that are clueless when it comes to computer technology. 

I’m seventy. I don’t feel seventy, compared with how our culture suggests seventy should feel. And people often tell me I don’t look seventy although I’m never sure what seventy is supposed to look like. But regardless of whether I look or feel my age, I get these old people comments frequently. 

The surprise implicit in these comments suggests that I don’t fit into their world view of older people. That somehow I’ve broken out of those perceptual boxes and boundaries. And there is tremendous freedom in that. 

Watching the movie, Moana, I fell in love with the grandmother. I especially enjoyed the exchange when the grandmother was down by the water dancing with the stingrays. Moana asked her grandmother why she was acting so weird. The grandmother’s reply is priceless.

I’m the village crazy lady. That’s my job.  

I find myself increasingly drawn to the village crazy lady personae. I dance to the background music at the grocery store which I have to acknowledge is more frequent than many would be comfortable to admit, I stop in a parking lot to just stand and look at the sky, I talk to random people I encounter. 

Dancing the village crazy lady, dancing the Crone. Breaking through stultifying stereotypes and  enchanting with the element of surprise. That’s my job.

And I would suggest that’s our job.

Blessings of Crone Wisdom,
Judith